Geraldo Rivera may run for U.S. Senate

Fox News personality Geraldo Rivera may run for the U.S. Senate from New Jersey in 2014 as a Republican, Rivera told his radio show on Thursday.

“I mention this only briefly: Fasten your seatbelts,” said the TV personality, probably best know for opening what was alleged to be mobster Al Capone’s safe. (There was nothing inside.) Rivera, 69, added that “at my age, if I’m going to do it, I’ve got to do it.”

Geraldo Rivera in December 2012. Getty Images

The five-times-married Rivera might find trouble fitting in with the Republican Party’s family values theme. On the other hand, aside from vastly popular Gov. Chris Christie, Republicans in the Garden State do not have a deep bench. They have not won a U.S. Senate election there in 40 years.

“I am (pondering a run), and I’ve been in touch with some people in the Republican Party in New Jersey: I am truly contemplating running for Senate against Frank Lautenberg or Cory Booker in New Jersey,” Rivera told listeners.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., will be 90 years old when his seat comes up next year. High-profile Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, a fellow Democrat, has sent signals he will make the race, only to get a nasty reaction from Lautenberg and his aides.

Rivera once made a name for himself with hard-hitting exposes, such as films revealing Dickens-like conditions inside state-run homes for the mentally ill in New York. He has specialized in much lighter fare in recent years as host of “Geraldo at Large.”

Rivera has claimed an intimate familiarity with some political figures. In his book “Exposing Myself,” the former Jerry Rivers boasted of affairs, flings and flirtations with Margaret Trudeau, then the estranged wife of Canada’s Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and Marian Javits, widow of New York’s Republican Sen. Jacob Javits. The list also included Liza Minelli, Bette Midler, Chris Evert and Judy Collins.